He did move to Los Angeles and he did write many more screen-plays, some of which were actually produced. There was, however, no renewed interest in Kiss and Tell. Although he saw her in several films, he never saw Nicki in person again.
The Wrong Thing Turgor
Today the clerk in the fancy deli next door asked me how I was, and I said, “I have deep longings that will never be satisfied.” I go in there all the time, so I thought it was okay. But she frowned slightly and said, “Is it the weather that does it to you?” “No,” I said, “it’s just my personality.” She laughed.
It’s the kind of thing that I enjoy saying at the moment but that has a nasty reverb. I want it to be a joke, but I’m afraid it’s not.
Last week a woman I have not spoken to for years called to tell me that someone I used to have sex with had died of a drug overdose. I was shocked to hear it, but not especially sorry. He’d had a certain fey glamour and a knack for erotic chaos that was both exhilarating and horrible, but he was essentially an absurdly cruel, absurdly unhappy person, and I thought that, in the end, he was probably quite relieved to go. I had not seen him in ten years, and our association had been pornographic, loveless, and stupid. We had had certain bright moments of camaraderie and high jinks, but none of it justified the feelings I’d had for him. Even now he occasionally appears in my dreams—loving and tender, smiling as he hands me, variously, a candy bar, a brightly striped glass ball, a strawberry-scented candle. In one dream he grew wings and flew to South America with me clinging to his back, ribbons flying from our hair and feet.
“I know he hurt you,” my friend said. “But I think he hurt himself a lot more.”
“Yeah,” I said. “He did.”
When I got off the phone, I sat still for some moments. Then I got up and dressed for the party I was about to attend. It was a birthday party for an acquaintance, a self-described pro-sex feminist who had created a public niche for herself as a pornographer and talk-show guest. I put on a see-through blouse, a black bra, a tiny black skirt, high-heeled boots, and a ratty black wig I had found in the bargain bin of a used-clothing store.
I took a taxi to the party, and the driver, whom I had engaged in conversation, commented on my clothes. “I just wondered,” he said, “why you’re dressed so, well, so . . . I mean . . .”
“You mean like a slut?”
“Uh, yeah.” He glanced in his rearview. “Not that I’m saying anything.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “It’s because I think it’s fun. It’s not a big scary sex thing. It’s an enthusiastic, participatory kind of thing. Besides, I’m thirty-nine, and pretty soon I won’t be able to do it anymore, because I’ll be an old bag.”
He nodded thoughtfully “Well, that’s cool,” he said. “It’s just that you don’t seem like the type who needs the attention.”
His comment was so touching that it made me feel maudlin, and feeling maudlin made me feel belligerent. “A guy I used to be involved with used to criticize me for not dressing slutty enough,” I said. “He said I wasn’t much of a girl. He’d probably like what I’ve got on, but the little jerk is dead now.” I dug around in my bag for the fare. The driver’s eyes flashed urgently in his rearview.
At the party, I quickly found the bar. I was working on getting drunk when I noticed that a pretty, snooty-looking boy was staring at me, his large eyes glowing with cheap, carnivorous ardor. I found that pleasing, especially coming from someone who looked at least ten years younger than I, but there was also something a little unnerving about it. It wasn’t exactly lust; it was a look of stunted idealism, a shallow romanticism that could only be disappointed at—even appalled by—the substance that lurks under any fancy facade, including mine.
“You look like a movie star,” he said.
I mumbled abashedly.
“How did you get your look?”
“It’s just a wig.” Perplexed and embarrassed to think he might be making fun of me, I looked at the gift table, upon which guests had impishly heaped dildos, vibrators, carrots, daikons, and cucumbers. “My,” I said, “look at that preponderance of elongated objects.”
“What?”
He looked at me askance; I immediately launched a meaningless exchange of questions and answers: “Where are you from?” “How long did you live there?” “Do you like San Francisco?”
“What is this, an interview?” he snapped.
“I was hoping it was an exchange of friendly noises,” I said.
“I’m going to get a drink,” he said. “I’m going to get a drink now.” He turned on his haughty heel. Already the substance had squished out and repelled him! Oh, well. I circulated, working hard on my drunken stupor. I was sitting with a jovial group of women when he approached me again. He had one of the impish daikons in his hand; he sat down and rapped the vegetable on the table and said, “I’ve got a point to make here.”
I gazed into space and murmured, “I hear you.”
After that we communicated more smoothly. We chatted about rock stars, haircuts, hair dye, and whether or not there is such a thing as national character. His name was Frederick. He said he had come to this party because his friend Al had given the birthday girl a computer, and he wanted Frederick, who was, it seemed, a particularly esoteric interface designer, to show her how to create her own web site. “He begged me to come,” said Frederick. “He even offered to pay me.” He sighed as if this request were a distasteful burden.
I tried to think of something to say, and while I was trying, a blond girl with a Polaroid camera came and asked us if she could take our picture. She was drunk, and she gave off a peculiar chemical shimmer that was sweet and lurid and had a seductive little suck to it. We assumed self-conscious expressions, and she took the picture. She handed it to me with a small, sharp smile and walked away.
Frederick and I decided to share a cab home. In the cab he sat very close to me, and that artificial closeness made me sense acutely how alone I would feel when I said good night and entered the long, dark hallway of my apartment. I interrupted our banal conversation by taking his hand; I was surprised when he gave me some sweet, gentle pressure.
“Frederick,” I said. “Would you like to come in for a minute?”
“Sure,” he said. “But I won’t stay for long.”
I said “Okay” very softly.
I offered him something to drink, but I only had rum and a few ounces of Jägermeister. We sat on the floor and shared the ounces.
“This is really weird,” I said. “I haven’t had anybody in my apartment like this for over a year.” He looked skeptical. My cat came into the room. I told him I’d had her for ten years. I said I was concerned about her weight because I’d recently taken in and tamed a feral kitten, who was probably hiding under the bed, and since kittens need to eat a lot I was compelled to overfeed the cat so she wouldn’t feel neglected.
“She isn’t fat,” Frederick said. “I think she’s pretty.”
Maybe he was nice after all. I raised one of my booted feet and coquettishly poked my pointed heel into his stomach. His face underwent a funny shift of expression. He kissed me. We lay on the floor, and I mauled him, pausing to gently touch my nose against his face, neck, and slight chest. He told me he was twenty-six. I told him I was thirty-nine. I said I hoped that my age didn’t bother him. I said that sometimes it bothered me and other times I looked forward to old-bagness, when I could stop worrying about sex and be like a kid again. I sat on him and lightly bounced. He said he thought I was a very interesting person and that he would like to see me in another context; he asked if I thought I’d like to “hang out” with someone so much younger. “I don’t know,” I said. “I might feel self-conscious, and besides, we might not like each other.” I bent and kissed him again, cupping his head the way I would hold a baby’s head to keep it from falling. “Before we left the party, Darleen told me something about you,” I said. “She said you were really good but that you wouldn’t call me the next day or the day after that or the day after that.”